Power Outage
by Destroyer Ov Nations
Summary: Something goes wrong on the ship. Can it be fixed? Will Ri'an get over his problem? Will some people even survive?


Sheldon squealed and leaped to his feet when water spilled onto him from Lovely's knocked over cup. The whole mess hall turned to look at him. "Sorry!" Lovely apologized.

"That's okay," Sheldon said. "My pants were already wet from the first three times."

"Glad it was you and not me," Zachary said.

"Careful, Doc. Next time I'll aim it at you," Lovely warned.

Zachary scooted his chair out of range, so now he was awkwardly sitting in the middle of the room without a table. With an excuse to leave early, Sheldon hurried away to change before Lovely could call him back.

"I wonder if we're near the planet yet," Zachary said as he held a piece of pizza over his face and waited for the cheese to slide off into his mouth.

Sheiree walked up. Zachary turned his head just as the cheese fell off and it landed on the side of his face.

"Hey, Love, I think I should inform you that Zachary is being really disgusting," Sheiree said, watching the sauce join the cheese on his face. He smeared it around because it felt cool.

"Do I need to throw some water on him?" Lovely replied. Zachary ducked unnecessarily and ran for cover.

"Anyway, Ri'an sent me to tell you that we're arriving at the planet now," Sheiree said.

They went to the bridge to see how things were going.

"Almost in orbit, Captain," Skip announced. "Almost...getting closer...here we go, anytime now...just a hop and a skip away...aaaannd..."

Suddenly the power went off and the lights went out and nobody could see. There was silence.

"Did we make it into orbit or are we going to crash and die?" Sheiree asked.

"I don't know. Could be either one," Skip replied.

Ri'an occupied himself with yelling at panicking ensigns. One of them might have fainted, and not out of fear of crashing.

Lovely tried to call engineering. "Curses, the comms are down."

In engineering Mykenzie and Josephine were trying to find an emergency flashlight. They gave up when they couldn't.

"I can't believe we don't have flashlights stored in here!" Mykenzie complained.

"How are you going to fix this?" Josephine asked.

"I'm just gonna have to not see what I'm doing, which could be very, very...very dangerous." Mykenzie's voice got lower and lower as she spoke.

Then she shouted, "HERE GOES!" and it scared an ensign and he started crying.

Sheldon and Zachary were in the brig because it was Zachary's turn to feed Savage and he was too much of a baby to do it alone. Now he was _really _being a baby because the lights went out.

"Can't Vortas see in the dark?" Sheldon asked.

"I can hardly see in the light!" Zachary whispered.

"Why are you whispering?" Sheldon asked.

"SHH!" Zachary shushed him. "Because if the power is out, that means the force field is down, and _that _means the thing is loose!"

"_Thing_!" a voice came out of the darkness. They could hear her moving.

"I told you to shush!" Zachary whisper-yelled at Sheldon.

"You were the one to get her mad!" Sheldon said back.

"Quick, let's get out of here!"

Sheldon ran after Zachary back the way they came in. They rammed into the powerless door. Then they started panicking and running all over the place.

"HIDE!"

"I can't see where I'm hiding!"

Savage sat there and watched them crash all over the room with amusement.

On the bridge nobody knew what to do. A pile of ensigns were cowering in the corner that Ri'an had backed them up into as he lecture-yelled at them about Starfleet officers being more brave.

Lovely was trying unsuccesfully to find the captain's chair, or any chair for that matter so atleast she could pretend. Finally she gave up and called Ri'an into her ready room for a private meeting. Luckily, the door was stuck open already.

"We have to talk, Ri," Lovely began.

"I know. Ensigns just aren't what they used to be. In fact, when I was an ensign-"

"Ri."

"Yes?"

"I agree with you, but this is not about the ensigns," Lovely said. "This is about the comms."

Ri'an shifted. "Yes, the comms are down, Captain."

"You know what I mean," Lovely scolded him. "Everytime I call you, you don't answer. What if it was an emergency? And what's with always sending the crew to come find me when you can just call me?"

"I told you, Captain. The comms cannot be trusted."

"Ri'an, we've went over this before. What is your issue with the comms?"

"Are you saying I have AN ISSUE!" Ri'an shouted.

"YES!" Lovely yelled back.

"I'm telling you, THE COMMS ARE EVIL!" Ri'an argued. "I'm not even gonna wear mine anymore!"

Ri'an tore his commbadge off and flung it. Then he stomped out of the ready room all huffy.

"YOU PUT THAT BACK ON MISTER!" Lovely tried to go after him but she tripped over a chair, and then a step, and then who knows what. "CURSES! SOMEONE HELP ME!"

Back in engineering Mykenzie thought she was getting somewhere, but she probably wasn't. "Josephine, stick your hand in there and pull that wire," she said.

Josephine started to do that, then paused. "Why? Is it going to electrocute me?"

"Probably. That's why I need you to do it."

Josephine wanted to give Mykenzie a look but it was too dark so she just stuck her hand in and pulled the wire. She got electrocuted and she jumped back. "Ow!"

Nothing happened. "Hmm, that must not have been it," Mykenzie mumbled.

"You mean that was for nothing!?" Josephine said.

"Yup."

Mykenzie moved to another control panel and started trying to do things. Josephine hunched after her.

"Stop that. You'll turn into a hunchback," Mykenzie said.

Josephine snapped straight. "How did you know I was hunching?"

"I always know when you're hunching," Mykenzie said creepily.

Josephine scooted away from her. (Atleast she hoped she did)

In the brig, Zachary and Sheldon were still managing to freak out all over the room. Finally, after a while, they collapsed.

It was silent for a long time. Savage crawled over to them and sniffed Zachary. She sneezed and decided it would be a better idea to sniff Sheldon.

Sheldon snapped awake and noticed. He leaped up and ran a couple of steps before falling over again. He sent Zachary into a spaz on the floor.

"I thought you killed yourselves," Savage said. "It was funny."

Neither of them knew what to say in such a situation.

"Do it again," Savage said.

They still didn't know what to say. They tried to be so silent that maybe Savage would forget about them. It didn't work.

"Do it again!" Savage got up and started chasing them.

They screamed for their lives and ran. Well, Sheldon was kind of bent-over run-crawling and Zachary was rolling around and couldn't seem to get up.

Meanwhile, on the bridge, Ri'an was taking his anger out on the traumatized ensigns while Lovely was still trying to find her way out of the ready room. Sheiree went in and helped her.

"Ri, you need to put your commbadge back on," Lovely said, trying to restore the peace.

"No," Ri'an said stubbornly.

"Commander..." Lovely warned. "You need to be more mature."

"I am mature! Maturer than you!" Ri'an whined immaturely. "I'm never putting that evil thing on again!"

"YOU HAVE TO!" Lovely shouted.

"NO, SHUT UP!"

"Curse you! You are condemned to your quarters after we fix the ship! And then I'm getting a new first officer."

"No! I'm sorry, Captain!" Ri'an apologized frantically. "I'll wear it, please don't replace me!"

"Fine. Good luck finding it." Lovely said. She returned to trying to find her chair but gave up and sat on the floor instead.

"Captain?" Skip asked hesitantly.

"Yes?"

"I don't think we're crashing. Because we probably would be crashed by now, don't you think? Maybe we're in orbit. Or just drifting. Or maybe we did crash and we are dead. Or maybe-"

"That's enough, Skip. We'll just have to find out once this problem is fixed."

Back in engineering, Mykenzie was still working while Josephine sat on her favorite console and waited.

"Are you sitting on that console again?" Mykenzie asked.

"Um...no?"

"Yes, you are. Get down from there, you'll mess something up."

Josephine sighed and slid off in the way she liked to slide off things. Mykenzie moved to that console and began feeling around. She flipped a switch and the power came back on.

"Oh, wow, you fixed it!" Josephine congratulated her.

Lovely called Mykenzie. "So what was the problem?"

"Josephine's butt was the problem," Mykenzie replied. "She sat on the on switch."

"Ah, well, it's great to have power back," Lovely said.

In the brig Sheldon and Zachary were passed out on the floor again. Savage was poking them. She ripped Zachary's shirt off, then decided that he was better off with a shirt on.

While she was trying to arrange the torn fragments of his shirt back on him, the door opened. Lovely, Ri'an, and Sheiree walked in.

"Shoo, shoo," Sheiree said, waving her hands at Savage, who stalked away across the room.

Ri'an kicked at Sheldon and Zachary until they woke up. "Light! Praise the Founders!" Zachary exclaimed.

"Are you guys alright?" Lovely asked.

"Yeah," Sheldon said.

"Why is my shirt all ripped up and falling off?" Zachary wondered.

"Glad I can't see that," Lovely said.

"I thought they died twice. It was funny," Savage said from the corner she'd retreated to.

"Hmm, well, you didn't kill them, so I think it's time for an upgrade," Lovely said. "Cherry, take Savage to some empty quarters and lock her in there. Ri'an, return to the bridge before Skip screws something up."

They both left to do those things.

"I'll make sure no one got hurt," Zachary said a bit too excitedly. Lovely knew he was just going back to the mess hall for more pizza.

"Just you and me, Admiral Sheldon," Lovely said.

"Um, yes, that is true, Captain," Sheldon replied.

"Let's go to the gym so you can get all hot and take your shirt off and then lead me around shirtless. Woo!"

Sheldon was at a loss for words, so they headed off to the gym.


End file.
